Purity and Grace
by in48frames
Summary: Sarah and Helena directly following the end of 2x04.
1. Chapter 1

When Sarah has calmed down (she's not _calm_, because Helena has a great fucking steak knife pressed to her back, but she can breathe and speak) she says, "Helena, cut me down. Cut me down, Helena."

Helena shuffles back and looks up at her again, her eyes tracking the blood that runs down the side of Sarah's neck. "He hurt you, sestra. How bad did he hurt you?" She turns and her whole body tenses as she raises the knife, ready to kill again, only to see Daniel lying in a pool of too much blood to possibly survive. Her shoulders fall and she turns back and reaches up, slicing the zip tie easily.

Sarah drops her arms, rubbing the circulation back into her wrists and without skipping a beat she steps around and away from Helena. Swaying forward, Helena starts to reach out but Sarah holds up her hands in front of her, palms out.

"No, Helena. Don't come any closer."

Helena looks down at the knife in her hand and then back up at Sarah, cocking her head. She drops the knife to the floor and shrugs. "We are one, sestra. By now, you must feel it, yes?"

"I need—" Sarah starts, then puts her hand up to her forehead. What good is the word of a—of a person like Helena? And what other bloody choice does Sarah have? "I need you to promise me you aren't going to hurt me, Helena. We're going to get out of this… together, yeah?"

Nodding eagerly, Helena folds her hands together in front of her in a gesture of supplication. "As I say, we are one, sestra."

"I need you to _promise me_, Helena." When Helena watches her silently, Sarah prompts, "Say, 'I promise.'"

"I promise," she echoes. After thinking for a second, Helena does the sign of the cross and bows her head. "Amen."

"Jesus Christ," Sarah says. "All right, let's find you some normal clothes, yeah?" She heads back out into the bedroom, stepping carefully around the pool of blood. "Rachel's got to have something nondescript stuffed down the very back of her closet. Then we're going to get the hell out of here. Helena?"

"Yes, sestra," Helena says from inches away and Sarah jumps.

"_Fuck_. Somebody needs to teach you about personal space but I don't have the bloody time. Look," she turns Helena around and points back at the bathroom. "Try to scrub some of the blood off your face while I'm looking for clothes, right? And take off that ghastly dress." Helena obeys, humming tunelessly to herself, and Sarah goes back to Rachel's drawers. She finds yoga pants and a tank top without much trouble, though Rachel doesn't appear to own anything with a hood. Sarah figures a scarf will have to do to disguise Helena's hair.

When Sarah ventures back into the bathroom, Helena is sitting cross-legged on the floor atop the tatters of the dress. With one hand, she's using a wet washcloth to scrub roughly at her skin; with the other, she's tearing at the ends of the dress.

From the back, Sarah can see all of Helena's scars, but at the same time she looks so impossibly small and bare that Sarah is reminded immediately of Kira. She feels the urge to take the washcloth from Helena and wash her properly, but no part of her ever forgets what Helena has done. They're going to get out of here together, yes, but Sarah has no bloody clue what she's going to do with Helena after that. She can't bring her back to Kira and Cal. She doesn't _want_ to bring her back to Fee, but she also can't leave Helena to whatever fate awaits her now.

As if she feels Sarah's presence, Helena looks back. "How is the little angel, sestra? Kira is safe?"

"Don't worry about her," Sarah says roughly.

"I will always worry. She is my _pleminnytsya_, my little angel." Helena smiles beatifically and Sarah gives a violent shudder.

"She's not yours, Helena. You know that, yeah?"

Helena squints and looks away, scrubbing hard until her skin turns bright red.

"All right," Sarah says, and when Helena doesn't stop she steps forward and wrenches the washcloth from her hand, jerking Helena up onto her feet by the arm and handing her the clothes. "Put these on, all right? I'll wait outside. We need to _go_."

Helena nods, but just before Sarah closes the door she says, "Sarah?"

"Yeah?"

Helena stands alone in the middle of the bathroom, skin porcelain white against the bright fluorescent and pale tile, vicious scar under her left breast, ribs poking out and knees knobbly. "You will not send me back, yes? It is agreed?"

Her voice shakes and Sarah feels it again, that protective urge. She stares at her for a second, trying to wish it away, then gives an inch and heaves a sigh. "You're not going anywhere. Get dressed."


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **_I needed more sestra time, c'est tout._

* * *

Cracking open the door, Sarah peeks up and down the hallway. The murder scene bears their signature in bloody ink, and their only hope of escape is to leave the building undetected. Seeing no one, she steps out, pulling Helena behind her by the arm. She has her hand wrapped just below Helena's elbow; Sarah tried to hold her by the wrist but Helena wouldn't stop twisting the joint to try and take Sarah's hand. Not bloody likely.

They take the elevator to the second floor, Sarah tapping her foot impatiently and Helena still as a china doll. On the slow ride down, Sarah notices a divide in her thoughts—from the corner of her eye she sees a slim girl in workout clothes, hair tucked neatly under a long black scarf, and one side of her brain wants to relax, wants to think, _This is normal, we can work together, everything is fine_.

But it's Helena, and every time her gut starts to unclench she remembers that and it tightens back up again.

The doors chime and Sarah jumps into action, leading them to the door to the stairs; she is surprised by how obediently Helena follows her, then she remembers Tomas and she isn't surprised at all.

The outside door is alarmed and Sarah lays her hands on the bar, counts to three, then pushes and shouts, "Run!" She zigs, zags, checking constantly for Helena and running until her intuition says stop. On another busy street she slows to a stroll, tugging Helena's arm and holding it until they match pace.

Sarah looks sideways to see how Helena is blending in and so she's watching when Helena stumbles, once and then immediately again, almost falling. Sarah catches her arm and pulls Helena out of the flow of pedestrians, holding her by the shoulders and trying to meet her eyes.

"Helena? Are you able to keep walking?"

She nods quickly, but her eyes are glassy and they don't focus on Sarah's—

_Are they ever not glassy?_ Sarah thinks. _What do they normally look like?_

—even when Sarah takes Helena's chin in her hand and forces her face to turn. "What do you need, Helena? Talk to me."

"I wish," Helena starts, and her head lolls away from Sarah's hand. "I don't wish to be any trouble."

Sighing impatiently, Sarah tugs at Helena's chin again and says, "I'm not leaving you here, so you might as bloody well tell me what it is you need."

"I am quite hungry," Helena says, meek and apologetic. "I have not much eaten since—" She puffs out her cheeks to make a childish explosion sound with her mouth and places her hand over the bullet wound on her torso.

Sarah winces, saying "They didn't feed you?" rhetorically and scouting for a nondescript place to eat.

They end up in a booth, the scene a twin of their little lunch date—Sarah sitting back and watching as Helena shovels food into her mouth.

"Where've you been, Helena?" Sarah isn't sure if she expects an answer, and when Helena continues to eat she thinks she won't get one.

Then, "They took me from the hospital," Helena says around a mouthful. "A farm has many fields, I run through them all, fast, very fast."

"Run through—?" Sarah starts, then shakes her head. "I'm guessing it wasn't a farmer that took you from the hospital."

Helena shrugs. "It was a farm." She stops short, all movement halting, and her face darkens as she looks down at her left hand. The ring is long gone, down the drain of Rachel's bathroom sink, but Helena holds up her hand, brows drawing together. "I was married."

"Fuck," Sarah breathes, straightening in her seat and staring at Helena. She remembers hearing that in the bathroom but her brain hadn't actually processed it at the time. Now the horror swells within her as she remembers what else Helena said; _they took something from inside of me_. "Oh my God, Helena, I'm sorry. You've done some shit but you never deserved that, I'm so sorry."

Helena grins suddenly, joy overtaking her face, and she says, "Thank you, sestra!" She goes back to shovelling food into her mouth, never taking her eyes off Sarah, and Sarah slumps back in her seat again, closing her eyes.

Never gets any less bizarre, does she.


End file.
